Fan of KnivesCooldown: 10 seconds / Throw knives out in a spiral around you, dealing450620% weapon damage to all enemies within 20 yards. Your knives will also Slow the movement of enemies by 60% for 1 second.

Probably lot of people will move to cold dmg. (including me) I've been gathering cold gear for about 2 months :), thx Blizz
Actually it looks like everything besides poison dmg got buffed. For the first days i will either stay with physical sentry or try the new cold one, perhaps cold arrow + cluster arrow sentry build.

I would never expected to see a buff for Sentries or even Multshot Arsenal. Since those are my favorite skills, i'm pretty happy. Even Strafe got his deserved improvement, but i think that increasing the damage alone isn't enough; it's mechanic is quite bad, expecially if you are not using Demolition or Emberstrafe, because i feel like it's a single target Whirlwind, and it doesn't help much when we are always fighting a large amount of monsters.

I would add that Spike Trap, while it got its damage increased, it's unbearable with that long arming time, that should be lowered a bit.

Overall, i'm pleased on what i read and i will probably play Demon Hunter in HC Ladder when the patch will come instead of going Crusader (so much lover from me for the new class.... i still have to start one).

I'm excited! The nats and shadows set buff give good AoE and survivabillity that I think will partner well with just about any build. Personally I'm excited to play a cold strafe, RoV spam, vengeance build. Great AoE great Crowd control, great fun !

i'm going to download the ptr this afternoon - so i can try the new changes (already have a Shadow set ready too).

I'm a fan of Cold damage and since many have already mentioned that new Awareness frees us a passive (also worth mentioning the fact that if you use Shadow set, you get a smaller but also effective version of it) this means Cull the Weak is aa straight 20% dmg increase.

A nother thing i'm really looking forward to is the new legendary that makes Chakram generate hatred - i hope it's a 1hand or a quiver. Only one thing that puzzled me a little is that all poison skills seem to have been switched to Cold (which is cool) but Chakram/Serpentine which is still poison. Probably somethings they just missed - a melee Chakram/FoK build with Shadow set is something i'd REALLY like to play.

EDIT: my idea of a build i'd really like to play given i manage to get all items needed for make it work. Also worth mentioning that since your discipline usage will be very low (only to activate shadow power once, pet and prep won't cost any discipline) AND we get a perma 35% dmg reduction from Shadow Power, maybe Perfectionist will become overkill in terms of survivability and thus will free us another passive skill.

I'm liking the build options that are opening up to us, as well as the enhancement to rocket builds like mine, but I'm finding that I can't even get a low tier greater rift key, ever. My killing times have just gone way up because I'm always out of hatred now. With the change to Preparation: Punishment having a twenty second cooldown and still only giving back 75 hatred, I fear I'm actually going to get screen burn-in with the message "Not enough hatred to use this skill", which I now always see.

The playstyle the devs hate so much is going to seem tame compared to what DH players will seek out now that their hatred generation capability is shot to hell. I can't even do well enough for a greater rift key on T1 - so why should I bother with higher Torment levels even if I can survive them now? There's just no point.

The point about being Hatred starved isn't much about we don't have enough hatred, but that we have only one really efficient spender at the moment - and it's CA. Damage wise it's awesome, but it's not resource efficient - that's why Cindercloth is so valuable.

What Blizzard is trying to do is to make abilities other than CA better because we can finally get away from it and stop being hatred starved. CA playstyle is exactly that, burning everything in a short time for huge burst opposed from other abilities.

Mara6 efficiency is due a lot to the fact turrets shooting CA basically remove the negative side of high ability cost and while your turrets spam CA you can spam aoe with multishot and mow down things extremely fast. Very likely Mara6 will still win compared to other solutions (a cold damage build will be viable because of Buriza+Nether Tentacles+Devouring Arrow), but it's kinda obvious since you're going to sacrifice any other piece of gear to gather the entire set.

Everything here holds only true for solo play. I just did a little group play on the PTR so far.

Fire Sentry build works really well - those buffs came unexpected (for me) and really pushed this build even more. I managed to beat a level 41 rift with the Loaded for Bear / Arsenal / Ballistics build and missed the 42 guardian by ~5 seconds.
As for other builds: I have tried physical Sentry and it can't seem to keep up with the fire build at the top end; the same holds true for Cold. However, they might work well in mid levels (20-30), where you don't have to sacrifice as many passives for defensive and can make use of Cull the Weak for example (confirmed: now works for sentries). Strongarm still doesn't proc from the sentries' own shots (you can apply it for them manually - not recommended though). Currently trying Chakram instead of Cluster.

The Shadow set is really fun to play with, but sentry will be mandatory when going into higher levels, as it just yields the greatest damage output in long fights. I can see a tanking build working (possibly even using a shield) with the set, as perma Gloom and the LoH really pushes survivability. Might open up new possibilites for Strafe and Bounty builds (perma +30% movespeed) along with the improved Natalya Set. Spike Traps still seem to be lackluster because of their long fuse time and comparably low damage (by the time a Long Fuse Spike Trap is gone, I have already set up 3 Sentries).

As for Punishment: Try to get rid of it altogether (I generally play Entangling / Cluster Bombs / Grenadier / Blood Vengeance) and use Marked for Death instead. Like this, you can use all your Discipline on Vault and adjust your position for perfect shots, so you won't need as many to kill monsters. Only works in party play though.

Also: Make sure you get rid of your Harrington Waistguard, as you won't need it in greater rifts. Unfortunately I seem to have scrapped all my String of Ears belts, so I figured I could use a Cord of the Sherma, but as of now I haven't tested it. Witching Hour might be worthwhile if you manage to roll a near perfect one and get to reroll attack speed into a defensive stat.

The thing I'm most excited about this patch is the fix of the IAS bug for sentries on different spenders, as I think it will open different options: Chackram/Elem arrow instead of multishot, or even a 3 spender sentry. Also, if the sentries can fire chackram instead of the default bolt, it will buff the damage of those of us that still use handXbows with Mara6, as the biggest problem of that setup was that the higher speed translated only in more default bolts.

Another issue that caught my attention is Ramaladni's Gift, because it doesn't say if the socket(s) will replace a property or not. If this item does not replace a property, it would be funny how in Vanilla a socket in a weapon was a must have, now is very good, and after patch 2.1 will be "a socket? I'd rather it had rolled VIT"

On other point, I think I'd level my second DH just to equip it with shadows and bounty with 30% increased speed

I feel this patch didnt change much for endgame dh. If it did anything it pushed the 6pc mara fire build(CA/Arsenal/Spitfire) even further ahead with the buffs to rockets.

As it is now, sentry build is the only way to comfortably do higher torments. I absolutely love the change to the Shadow's Mantle, but what good will it be to be super tanky if you cant kill mobs in a timely manner because you are hatred starved...

hmm yeah, still too much M6 going on for my taste.
what sounds interestingis Shadow Set with Night's Bane which would be nice if didn't use slots you need for other items. Either for M6 or Cinder, Mages, Hexing Pants if Cluster..

Quote fromwudijo
As for other builds: I have tried physical Sentry and it can't seem to keep up with the fire build at the top end; the same holds true for Cold. However, they might work well in mid levels (20-30), where you don't have to sacrifice as many passives for defensive and can make use of Cull the Weak for example (confirmed: now works for sentries). Strongarm still doesn't proc from the sentries' own shots (you can apply it for them manually - not recommended though). Currently trying Chakram instead of Cluster.

I'm a little sad about phisical builds - i have a full phisical setup and need to switch pieces/reroll gear.

Anyway i don't know why you think you will need to ditch Cull The Weak for higher levels - a setup likeTHISis perfectly viable for higher levelsand i don't see what defensive passives you need more Maybe fire builds will be better overall, but COld will be at least a decent option.

The build above focuses on Buriza anyway, that's the reason i put Devouring Arrow in (it's a HUGE single target damage source);THISis a variant making use of Kridershot (less average damage, but faster attacks and room for MfD).